Thursday, May 15, 2008

What to do with uncomfortable feelings

One of the most powerful and helpful meditative slogans I've come across is this one: "Liberate yourself by examining and investigating." Byron Katie looks at it this way:
An uncomfortable feeling is not an enemy. It’s a gift that says, “Get honest; inquire.” We reach out for alcohol or television or credit cards, so we can focus out there and not have to look at the feeling. And that’s as it should be because in our innocence we haven’t known how. So now what we can do is reach out for a paper and a pencil, write our thoughts down, and investigate them.

1 comment:

  1. I spent about an hour sitting outside drinking coffee with a couple of friends tonight, talking mostly about the ultimately self-destructive ways we'd coped with our uncomfortable feelings. Rob said simply -- "Now we know better". And we do. It's hard work sometimes, but we do it, and we did it tonight too, then congratulated each other on how far we'd come in the year we've known each other. The best part was, we all knew it was God what did it.

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